Hiring is hard because we believe that we are better at it than what we actually are. It can be fixed. In easier ways than you think.
Hiring is hard
Most people are very bad at hiring. They get away because 70% of the organizations do not track whether the people they hired did actually turn out to be what they expected. Investing in grooming internal talent is important. That is your best insurance against poor hiring.In an interview with New York Times, Wharton Prof Peter Cappelli had said organizations must recognize that there will be uncertainty in demand for talent. “Training smaller classes of managers more often and creating a companywide pool of talent is a smart strategy.” Getting employees to work voluntarily on stretch assignments made the employees more valuable inside the organization and outside.I had interviewed him in Sept 2010. I had asked him about what skills will be valuable in HR – for people who are just starting their career and those who have several years of experience in HR. Know what the business is looking for, he said. (Read the interview here)
Who is To Blame for Bad Hires
People are the greatest competitive advantage. Yet most companies struggle to recruit, train and retain capable workers. Nothing seemed to have changed since 2008. Here is what NYTimes found in 2008
Managers surveyed by the firm blamed everything from short-term financial pressures — which keep them from investing in talent development — to less-than-capable human resource departments for the persistence of the problem.
Hiring – How to Fix It
Peter Cappelli suggests a few easy to implement ideas on how to improve your hiring process
-
Ask the hiring manager after a few months if they would hire this person again. If they hesitate, you know that the new hire did not turn out to be what they thought.
-
Evaluate performance feedback with interview comments.
-
If you outsource your hiring, don’t just push your hiring partners on keeping costs low and speed of hiring. Think of it like going to a restaurant instead of eating at home. You don’t always want to eat fast-food.
My tip: Invest time crafting the job description. Then figure out how to evaluate what you are looking for.What is your tip for hiring better?Here is Peter Cappelli’s interview in Harvard Business Review. <
>Here is a Sketchnote of the key ideas.
